A twice-weekly syndicated newspaper column on California public affairs.

Monday, April 25, 2016

EXPECT SENATE RACE TO GET FAR FIERCER

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, MAY 10, 2016, OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“EXPECT SENATE RACE TO GET FAR
FIERCER”

In more than a year since state
Attorney General Kamala Harris declared she’s running for the Senate seat soon
to be vacated by retiring Democrat Barbara Boxer, Harris’ poll numbers have not
changed much.

She pulled about 31 percent in the first public poll on the
contest; she got 27 percent and 33 per cent in the two latest surveys, leaving
her still the clear leader less than two months before the June 7 primary
election.

So far, no one has laid a glove on
her, but her numbers are static.

And very few seem to care. The latest
California Field Poll found fully 48 percent of likely voters undecided in this
contest as of early April. So most were not interested, many unaware there’s
even a Senate contest underway.

“Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders and
Hillary Clinton have sucked all the air out of the room,” opined Democratic
Orange County Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez the other day, referring to the
presidential nominating races on the same June ballot.

Sanchez polls second in the race, at
15 percent in early April, up from about 8 percent a year ago. Three
Republicans in the race, Silicon Valley entrepreneur Ron Unz and former state
GOP chairmen Tom Del Beccaro and Geoge (Duf) Sundheim, had a combined 11
percent, splintered three ways.

If the undecideds eventually break in
the same proportion as those who have already made up their minds, the November
runoff contest will feature two Democrats and no Republicans, under the top two
primary system that puts the two leading June vote-getters into a November
faceoff.

But this so-far-sleepy race will soon
become more heated. Harris has taken criticism in the last two weeks for having her
office represent Gov. Jerry Brown in his effort to keep secret more than 65
emails between him or his staff and the state Public Utilities Commission from
2013 and 2014, when the PUC was deciding who would pay for blunders and
disasters at Pacific Gas & Electric Co. and Southern California Edison Co.
that saw the 2012 closure of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station and the
deadly 2010 San Bruno natural gas explosion.

Consumer groups claim it’s a conflict
of interest for Harris to represent Brown when he or his chief of staff, former
PG&E lobbyist Nancy McFadden, might become witnesses in Harris’ ongoing
criminal investigation of apparent PUC collusion with the big utilities.

Outside ethics experts agree it’s a
conflict, and you can bet Sanchez will hit Harris on it soon. Harris refused to
comment, but her office released a statement claiming there’s an “ethical
firewall” between lawyers investigating the PUC and those representing Brown.

Sanchez, meanwhile, will take fire in
this mostly liberal state for voting to give gun makers immunity from lawsuits
when their products are used in crimes.

But Sanchez is not shy about answering
her critics. To those who blasted her for saying between 5 percent and 20
percent of Muslims would like to see a world-wide caliphate a la the terrorist
Islamic State, she says, “Those are the numbers. No experts give a number under
20 percent. I’ve spent 20 years on the House Foreign Affairs Committee and visited
many foreign Muslim leaders and they say it’s a huge worry for them. I was just
at West Point and they talked about this. It’s in congressional testimony.”

But Sanchez says she, like many
voters, knows little about the three Republicans in the race. “I don’t know
them and the voters don’t, either,” she said. So she believes she will survive
past June and move on to a hot challenge of Harris and the Democratic Party
establishment in the fall.

“I think the San Francisco Democratic
Party establishment clearly told people other than the San Franciscan to stay
out,” she said, referring to Harris. That city’s establishment has dominated
California politics in recent years, giving the state leaders like Brown, Lt.
Gov. Gavin Newsom, Sens. Boxer and Dianne Feinstein and Harris, a former San
Francisco district attorney.

Meanwhile, the three Republicans each
hope to make it past June, but none has nearly as much campaign cash as either
Harris or Sanchez.

It adds up to a potentially
fascinating race, and one sure to become fiery as mail balloting begins in
mid-May.

-30-

Email
Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough,
The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch
It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias
columns, visit www.californiafocus.net

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About Me

Thomas Elias writes the syndicated California Focus column, appearing twice weekly in 88 newspapers around California, with circulation over 2.2 million.
He has won numerous awards from organizations like the National Headliners Club, the California Newspaper Publishers Association, the Los Angeles Press Club, and the California Taxpayers Association. He has been nominated three times for the Pulitzer Prize in distinguished commentary.
Elias is the author of two books, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government's Campaign to Squelch It" (now in its third edition; also published in Japanese and recently optioned for a television movie) and "The Simpson Trial in Black and White," co-authored with the late Dennis Schatzman.